


Too Quiet

by vampireinadeviltown



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Eventual Smut, F/M, Slow Burn, it's getting the e for later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-30
Updated: 2016-06-01
Packaged: 2018-07-11 05:31:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7030984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vampireinadeviltown/pseuds/vampireinadeviltown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He choked.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He froze. God fucking damn it he froze. In the span of seconds he wasn’t in the Commonwealth he was back in that metro, Duncan in arm, listening to Lucy scream. Not just scream, oh no, scream his name, scream for help. You don’t go through the waste and assume you’ll never see a feral ghoul but it was the situation that had him frozen in place. He had been paid to watch her back and he almost let her die.

He’d be kidding himself if he thought the caps were the only thing making him protect her. She looked so fragile with her soft skin and those dark circles under her eyes, eyes that were so big and wide they resembled a puppy more than a human. So physically she was someone you wanted to protect and then she would open that mouth and say exactly what you needed to hear. It was no wonder she was the general, she had a way of inspiring loyalty, and she had MacCready’s even if it wasn’t worth shit. Even if he almost let her die.

That was a mistake that wouldn’t happen again.

Mac kept reminding himself that she was okay as he sat on a stool in the doctor’s hut as he flushed her system. She had been sick as a dog all through the night, radiation poisoning and they were fresh out of Radaway, he wasn’t even sure if that would have cured it all. He had kept watch while she tossed and turned and vomited. Then for a brief moment when she went still he thought maybe he had killed her after all.

“I’m fine Mac,” Rebecca said as the doctor stitched her up. She didn’t even wince as the needle pulled skin together. She was tough, he would give her that much.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he said as he tried to appear more relaxed.

Her coloring was better, her eyes were brighter, and the doctor had wiped away the thick coating of grime that had covered her skin. She was alive and breathing and not torn to pieces in Hubris comics. She was alive.

He’d be lying if he said he didn’t check every bit of exposed skin for blue boils as he trailed behind her on their way back to Sanctuary.

He wouldn’t know the way to Sanctuary if it bit him in the ass—the behind. The behind. He couldn’t scout ahead he could only follow. It took three days to get to Sanctuary and if this was the future MacCready wasn’t sure he was ready for it.

It wasn’t a settlement but it wasn’t a raider outpost it was something in between and he wondered if it was all of her design.

“I’m glad to see you’re back, General,” a tall man in a leather hat said as he approached eyeing, MacCready carefully, hand placed on his laser pistol.

“Glad to be back Garvey,” she said with an easy smile as she dropped her pack to her feet swaying a little where she stood. She was still tired. She was still beaten up. It was still his fault.

“I just received word—“

“Of a settlement in need of my help?” She asked and to Mac’s surprised the big guy looked bashful.

“I’ll mark it on the map in your office,” he told her and she smiled warmly.

“Thanks Garvey. This is MacCready by the way,” she said as she gestured towards him.

MacCready stood at attention and hitched the strap of his rifle over his shoulder.

“It’s nice to meet you,” Garvey said but the twitch in his lip betrayed him.

“Likewise,” MacCready said with a tip of his hat.

“We have space for him don’t we?” Rebecca asked. “I sent word back with my traders in Oberland.”

“Yes, we made room for him in the barracks,” Garvey replied dryly.

“Perfect!” Rebecca said, almost too chipper, as she clapped him on the back. She picked her pack up again. “Where’s Dogmeat?” She asked as she let out a whistle.  
Quick as a shot a big german shepherd came bounding from around a patched up house. The big thing lumbered into her and they looked like dance partners as the dog licked her face. She winced as his legs rubbed against bandaged wounds but didn’t push him down, instead she buried her face against the fur of his neck and planted and audible kiss.

It was all so soft it made MacCready look away. 

He lost her in between dinner and drinks. He lost her to her people. Her people. That was such an odd thought but that’s what they were. They were crowding around her asking questions, making sure she was okay, and it was the months of being neck deep in deadly situations that him attuned her her posture, her face, the look in her eyes. She was tired and she wanted to run but she stood there looking out over the groups of people who wanted to see how she was doing. MacCready didn’t remember the last time he felt that loved, even when he was mayor it didn’t look like that. They were all under her spell, and by the sagging in her shoulders he could tell it was a spell she hadn’t meant to cast.

He was standing in line for food dished up by a robot, Codsworth, who was whirring from one dish to the next chipper and annoying. MacCready couldn’t handle that level of intensity even when he wasn’t nursing wounds.

He took his plate and made his way down to the river. This place was no Goodneighbor. He had fit in there, a mercenary who was looking for caps, and people who needed others taken care of. It was a symbiotic relationship. He wasn’t sure how he was going to fit in here.

He felt someone approach and heaved a sigh before he smelled that familiar perfume. Something herbal but not.

“You found my spot,” Rebecca said as she plopped down next to him, wincing and readjusting herself before taking a sip of her Gwinnet stout.

“Isn’t this whole place your spot?” MacCready shot back as he stared out at the river. A tire floated downstream and it made Rebecca frown.

She shook her head, “no, it’s theirs. I don’t belong here,” she said as she looked back up the hill.

“Coulda fooled me,” MacCready replied as he took a bite out of a brahmin steak.

“I used to,” she conceded. “That was before,” she said with a sigh.

“Before what?” He asked.

“Forget it,” she said after a long moment. “Enjoy your meal,” she said as she hauled herself to her feet.

He wanted to call after her, make her sit down and talk to him, because if anyone knew what it was like to be an interloper it was MacCready. Instead he let her go, she disappeared into the throng of people, and she was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

No one was more aware of how ill suited he was in Sanctuary than Robert Joseph MacCready. He was getting antsy sitting around and waiting for Rebecca to tell him it was time to head out. Of course he had been paid to do a lot worse than sleep in a god’s honest bed and eat three meals a day, but he needed the road, he needed more opportunities to make caps, he needed more chances to save Duncan.

Sometimes he thought about telling Rebecca about Duncan but it hurt just to think his name, let alone say it out loud, but if anyone was going to understand he was certain it was going to be her. Hell, she was changing the world trying to find her son. She would understand but he didn’t want to open that door. 

So instead MacCready sat in the common eating area watching her flit from table to table talking to settlers and her inner circle and he drank his dirty wastelander “It’s a little early for a drink don’t you think?” This woman in a red jacket and newsboy cap said as she sat down across from him. 

MacCready snorted as he took another sip, “it’s a little early to be getting into other people’s business don’t you think?” He questioned. 

A small smile pulled at the corner of her lips, “getting into people’s business is my business. I’m Piper.” 

Begrudgingly he sighed, “MacCready.” 

“I know,” she said smugly. “How did you meet Blue?” She asked. 

“Blue?” MacCready asked, his eyebrows pulling together.

“Rebecca,” she replied flatly. 

He shrugged, “it’s a business arrangement.” 

Her eyes narrowed and Mac felt as if she could see into his brain, read his thoughts, so he took another sip hoping things would get too muddled for her to read them. 

“If you want to play things close to the vest that’s fine,” she told him with a shrug as she cast a glance towards Rebecca. “But nothing stays secret for long out here,” she said as she stood up. “Enjoy your drink Robert Joseph MacCready.” 

MacCready stared after her, mouth opening and closing like a fish on land, and she disappeared into one of the buildings he had yet to explore. 

Truth be told he didn’t want to do much exploring he wanted to head out. There was a settlement that needed her right? Caps would probably be involved, it would get him out of Sanctuary, and it would be just the two of them again. 

It was a week before they headed out. A week of dodging Piper and Preston and sticking as close to the boss as possible. He felt like a puppy following her at her heels but this new environment wasn’t going to help him, she was. 

“Are you ready?” She asked as she shoved Stimpaks into her bag. 

“I was born ready, Boss.” 

She smiled a little, “then lets head out.” 

She looked better than she had when they arrived in Sanctuary. Of course that was his fault. 

“I meant to give you something,” she said as she came to a stop in front of the Red Rocket. 

“What?” MacCready asked, half expecting a mean right hook to the jaw. 

She shuffled through her pack and pulled out a Gragnok the Barbarian comic. It was in perfect condition not like the charred up and crinkled pieces of sh-crap he had been reading on the road. 

“Where did you get that?” He asked. 

“Hubris,” she said as she stood up and handed it to him. “You like those right?” She asked. 

“Yeah, thanks,” he said as he placed it in his satchel and shoved his hands in his pocket, his fingers grazing over the smooth head of that toy soldier. That was the last gift that had been given to him. 

They traveled in relative silence and silence was something MacCready hated. 

“It’s quiet,” he said slowly. “Too quiet,” he finished before he started to crack himself up. “I always wanted to say that.” 

Rebecca cast a glance over her shoulder, tendrils of black hair obscuring those puppy dog eyes, and MacCready had to resist the urge to brush them out of the way. “For being some big bad merc you sure are a nerd," she scoffed and MacCready grinned, honest to god grinned, a big missing toothed smile. 

MacCready caught himself and cleared his throat, “so where are we going to Boss?” 

“Gotta clear some ghouls out of a potential settlement,” she began and MacCready’s stomach turned. “Then we have to go around our asses to get to our elbow and clear out a building,” she continued and MacCready scrambled to keep up. “Yeah, I know, I know,” she postured at his silence, “but there supposed to be a lot of caps in it, and we need them for the next step.” 

“The next step in what?” MacCready asked.

Their arrangement hadn’t hindered on a lot of explanation on Rebecca’s part. When she sauntered into his back room at Goodneighbor it was all he could do to keep his cool with Winlock and Barnes breathing down his neck and keep his jaw off the floor when he saw her. 

“I’ll tell you when the time is right,” she told him, effectively ending any line of questioning on Mac’s part. 

It was just the two of them on the road, like it had been for the first two months MacCready had known Rebecca, and he liked the familiarity. Busting skulls for caps and sleeping wherever they could find shelter. They were like an old west comic. 

Only now he knew her, he knew by the tension in her shoulders whens someone was close, when he tapped three times on the closest surface she knew to duck, they were like a well oiled machine and that made him lazy. That was how Hubris happened. 

Rebecca decided to set up camp at the Sunshine Trading Co. future settlement of the Minutemen. It sounded so haughty it made MacCready gag on his mirelurk cake. 

They were seated around a cooking station in a barn that still stank of feral ghouls even though they had carted the corpses out hours ago. That smell was going to take days to waft away, if not a week, and Mac was hoping they wouldn’t be around to see exactly how long it took. 

“Boss?” MacCready began as he looked across the pit at Rebecca. The firelight had cast a warm glow on her face, the shadows of her lashes spread like spider legs across her cheeks. He wanted to kiss them. 

What the fuck Robert Joseph. 

“Yeah?” She mumbled around a mouthful of food, looking up as she wiped the corner of her mouth with her sleeve. The woman had almost no tact and he loved it. “I wanted to say I’m sorry,” he mumbled and her already large eyes almost bugged out of her skull. 

“Are you sick?” She asked him with a laugh and heat creeped up his neck. 

“Forget it,” he huffed as he stood up, walking out of the barn, rifle over his shoulder.

“MacCready!” She called after him but he didn’t look back. “Mac, I’m sorry,” she said as she jogged up behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off. 

“Just forget it,” he repeated as he looked out at the still night. It was easier to breathe out here without the heat and the stench. 

“What are you sorry for?” She asked him as she stood in front of him, hand on her hip. That full him that that stupid blue vault suit accentuated perfectly. 

“For Hubris,” he told me. 

“Your Hubris?” She asked with a grin. 

“What?” Mac asked, perplexed and a strange look crossed her face. 

“Forget it,” she said with a sigh. Must be one of those past things he still didn’t get. It was like she was constantly telling private jokes that only her and a handful of ghouls were privy to. “Don’t be sorry for it,” she replied easily. 

“Well you paid me to watch your back and you almost died,” he pointed out. 

“Yeah, well, you get what you pay for and I only paid you 200 caps,” she said as she walked past him, bumping his hip with hers. 

In that moment he might have fallen a little in love with her and he hated her for it. 

She walked back into the barn and after a few minutes MacCready joined her, sitting opposite his boss once more.

“I’ll take first watch,” she announced, “you get some sleep.”

The Waste did not make a heavy sleeper. You always had to be on your toes, listening for raiders, for creatures, for rad storms. So when he heard Rebecca scream in the dead of night MacCready was on his feet faster than his gun could shoot a bullet.

**Author's Note:**

> OKay so be nice guys


End file.
